Mawson Resources shares soar, hits 6 metres of 617 g/t gold at Rompas

Scandinavian explorer Mawson Resources (TSE:MAW) saw its shares jump more than 32 per cent Thursday after announcing the first drill results from its Rompas gold project in Northern Finland.

The company said results from 14 holes are available so far, out of a planned 39 diamond drill hole program at the site.

The best result returned is 6 metres at a whopping 617 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from 7 metres depth in drill hole ROM0011.

This wider intercept includes 1 metre at 3,540 g/t gold from 11 metres depth, the best result from surface sampling or drilling at the Rompas property to date.

Mawson shares were lately up more than 23 per cent to $1.33 late Thursday morning.

Mawson said it has drill defined a more than 100 metre wide gold anomalous zone, characterized by hydrothermal calc-silicate veining and alteration. Some veins host significant visible gold, the miner said.

First drill testing of the Rompas project has only covered a small percentage of the 6-kilometre-long mineralized trend at the project, the company added.

This means that securing permits to test the best geological targets within the entire trend has now become "even more of a priority", "in order to establish the potential of one of the world's most exciting gold exploration  properties," said president and CEO, Michael Hudson.

"With channel sampling over a 6 kilometre strike returning hundreds of high-grade gold samples, the next target to achieve at Rompas was a high-grade drill intersection over a significant width.

"We achieved this aim spectacularly in our  first drill program with the best result returned so far from Rompas,  being 6 metres at 617g/t gold from 7 metres depth in drill hole  ROM0011. 

"These are early days at Rompas with only a few percent of the  known mineralized area tested to date. 

The drill program provided the company the first opportunity to sample  continuously across the mineralized footprint. 

So far, 37 holes for 3,910 metres have been drilled at south Rompas, with two holes remaining to complete the program.

Drilling was completed on 20 to 40 metres spaced sections with drill holes averaging 100 metres in depth. Drill recoveries are "excellent", Mawson noted, and average close to 100 per cent in fresh rock.  

The company said that drilling thus far has not defined the scale, orientation or continuity of the high grade structures, with future exploration work needed to test two different scales.

Firstly, Mawson will need to drill the large known mineralized area over its 6 kilometre trend, and then drill and understand the controls of gold mineralization within individual high grade structures.

Mawson holds 833 claims and claim applications for 75,340 hectares at  the Rompas project.

A total of 110 exploration claims that form the core claims at Rompas were  granted on October 31, 2010, but do not come into legal force until  after a standard appeal process, the company said.

A "key decision point" on the appeal process is expected in the third quarter. After this process is completed, roughly 30 per cent of the 6 kilometre trend will be available to drill.

Regarding the remaining 70 per cent of the trend, drilling and trenching are not permitted. Mawson must apply for a modification of a claim decision by conducting an environmental program, which has already started and is expected to be complete in the fourth quarter.

The miner then anticipates the modification decision over the area will be taken next year.

Mawson Resources' Rompas project is now at the centre of exploration efforts after the company successfully spun-out its South American assets into Darwin Resources (CVE:DAR).

Mawson is a resource acquisition and development company with precious and base metal interests in Finland and Sweden. Its flagship property is Rompas, with sample assays up to 33,200 ppm gold and 56.6% uranium oxide.

Rompas was discovered by French nuclear giant AREVA in 2008 and purchased by Mawson in April 2010.

The company, whose management has a combined in excess of 100 years of experience, has been active in Scandinavia for well over a decade.

It even maintains propertyfield bases in the Swedish town of Malå, where many of the region's core samples are stored and processed and in Lohijarvi in Northern Finland.

Recently, Mawson spun-off a portfolio of early stage copper-gold Peruvian assets, which include the Alto Quemado, Huatiapa, Carrizales, Vicunas and Luminaria projects to Darwin Resources, allowing Mawson to focus on the development of Rompas.